Mantrapping for Sport and Profit

The forth full-length album from crusty punks Scissorfight shows the band tightening their sound into a impressive stoner metal force to be reckoned with. The excellent production (by Andrew Schneider and Craig Riggs, along with the band) shapes the thick guitars into brutal chunks of shrapnel, cutting through the songs with a frightening fury. Ironlung's vocals also improve on this album, falling somewhere between Gwar's Oderus Urungus and Clutch's Neil Fallon. It is his charismatic growl that gives this album the strong personality it needs. Although their lyrics are still pretty average, the delivery makes up for it in spades. The album is a tad overlong, mostly due to the amount of time the band is willing to spend on one riff. But most of the songs are pretty short and harmless, and the band has a good sense of track placement that keeps things interesting. The average listener may not be impressed, but fans of stoner metal may want to give this a listen.